What it does: Uses iPhone’s accelerometer to monitor your movements during the night and determine when you’re most likely to be in and out of a dream state; records your sleep activity and gradually learns your sleep patterns; about 30 minutes before your alarm is set to go off, the app begins watching for the lightest portions of your sleep cycle and gently prods you awake with your choice of soothing preset sounds

What it does: Tracks food and fitness for calories-in and calories-out tally; also offers access to a collection of almost 200,000 user-submitted recipes via the SparkRecipes application; browse recipes by cuisine, dietary needs and course, email recipes to friends and view full nutritional information

FITNESS

What it does: The tracking system uploads all of the information captured by the BodyMedia FIT armband (number of steps taken, calories burned, duration and quality of sleep, etc.) and allows you to store it all in one place; through the Activity Manager Dashboard, you can enter specific goals and tailor your activity and diet to reach them

Cost: The app is free for the first three months (after trial period, it costs $6.95 per month); the armband costs $199